Page:Harold Titus--Timber.djvu/310

302 Her voice husked for the first time.

"Your chance?" he asked.

"My chance! I'm bound to you by my habit of thinking, now. I have some confidence that you will be able to give me the things I have sought for years. But if you should fail I don't believe that I could begin over, hunting fortune like a cat stalks its food. I'm weak—weak enough to want you to win; but if you should fail it might be necessary for me to try something else. I might be a nurse or an office woman or any number of things if necessary; and sometimes, lately, I've hoped it might be necessary!

"There, I mustn't cry! I'm sunburned enough, and it makes me weak. It's a long drive ahead. Here comes Fan."

When she was gone in a cloud of dust, whipped away by the hot wind Rowe stood at the curb a long interval, head cocked, watching her roadster disappear into the jack pines. When he turned back into the hotel he was scratching his chin and his crafty eyes showed a strange bafflement. He had found that thing in Marcia Murray which had staggered him in John Taylor, honesty and genuine impulse. In her, however, it had been but a flash, to revive again only in case he failed in the game he played.

He snapped his thumb and laughed—somewhat uncertainly.